Heritage Bank disburses N251 million under CBN youth entrepreneurship fund

27 Feb 2017
Financial Nigeria

Summary

Heritage Bank said 94 beneficiaries have received a total of N251 million from the YIEDP fund.

Ifie Sekibo, Managing Director/CEO, Heritage Bank

Heritage Bank, a Nigerian financial institution, has said it is making disbursements to beneficiary businesses under the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) N3 billion Youth Innovative Entrepreneurship Development Programme (YIEDP), according to the bank’s spokesperson. Heritage Bank is the sole financial institution managing the fund and making disbursements to approved beneficiaries.  

Heritage Bank’s Group Head – Corporate Communications, Fela Ibidapo, said 94 successful applicants who met the requirements for obtaining the loans have already received a total of N251 million from the YIEDP fund. Also, 310 successful businesses have been approved by the CBN to receive a total sum of N774 million. A further 191 applicants have not picked up their approval letters, which upon receipt will provide them access to a total of N473 million. So far, only 25 applicants have dropped out of the project.

The programme is run in partnership with the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC). Successful candidates must still be NYSC members or must have been discharged from the corps not more than five years post-service.

According to Ibidapo, the bank’s support and participation in the project stems from the need to empower young Nigerian entrepreneurs, create jobs and ensure the even distribution of financial resources within the economy.

Besides the creation of jobs, Ibidapo explained that YIEDP was set up to help the youths contribute to the country’s non-oil Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and ease the challenges experienced by youths due to the difficult economic circumstances in the country.

Ibidapo further disclosed that the scheme was not a one-off operation, but will be run in phases. According to him, the revolving credit nature of the scheme requires a rigorous process to ensure that all parties involved achieve their goals.

The YIEDP scheme grants loans to businesses in sectors such as agro-allied, food processing and preservation, arts and craft, manufacturing, ICT, construction support, power & energy, film and photography, education and automobile. The first screening of applicants for the scheme commenced on March 15, 2015.


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